In the Garden Garden catalogues arrive almost daily, many of
them from smaller growers who have started of recent years. They are well worded and illustrated, but singularly unvaried. I happened to wish to buy some lily bulbs, especially Martagon, Tiger and Orange Lily. In none of the catalogues were any of these offered ; and all of them concentrated an Lifium Candidum, the Madonna Lily. Let no one belittle this favourite of the cottage garden, but there are others as hardy and beautiful and less liable to leaf disease, say, Regale and Auratutn. It has been argued that the one native English lily, with special reference to a wood in Surrey, is the Martagon, but I fear that it is odds that any wild lily would vanish. The temptation to transfer it to the garden would be too great ; and indeed flowers, not least ferns, need stricter preservation than birds. Their purloiners are much more numerous. ___
W. BEACH THOMAS.
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